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a girl and there were mysteries that only the male mind could understand.
    ‘Well,’ as Mavi had once told Menolly and Sella, ‘there are feminine puzzles that no mere man could sort, so that score is even.’
    ‘And one more for the feminine side,’ said Menolly as she followed the fire lizards. A mere girl had seen what all the boys – and men – of the Sea Hold had only dreamed of seeing, fire lizards at play.
    They’d ceased following the queen and her bronzes and now indulged in mock air battles, swooping now and then to the land itself. And seemingly under it. Until Menolly realized that they must be over the beaches. The sand was slipping under her feet. An unwary step could plunge her into the holes and dips. She could hear the sea. She changed her course, keeping to the thicker patches of coarse marsh grasses. The ground would be firmer there, and she’d be less visible to the fire lizards.
    She came to a slight rise, before the bluff broke off into a steep dive on to the beaches. The Dragon Stones were beyond in the sea, slightly hidden by a heat haze. She could hear fire lizards chirping and chattering. She crouched in the grasses and then, dropping to her full length, crept to the bluff edge, hoping for another glimpse of the fire lizards.
    They were quite visible – delightfully so. The tide was out, and they were exceedingly busy in the shallows, picking rockmites from the tumbled exposed boulders, or wallowing on the narrow edging of red and white sand, bathing themselves with great enthusiasm in the little pools, spreading their delicate wings to dry. There were several flurries as two fire lizards vied for the same choice morsel. In that alone, she decided, they must differ from dragons; she’d never heard of dragons fighting amongst themselves for anything. She’d heard that dragons feeding among herds of runner-beasts and wherries were something horrible to behold. Dragons didn’t eat that frequently, which was as well or not all the resources of Pern could keep the dragons fed.
    Did dragons like fish? Menolly giggled, wondering if there were any fish in the sea big enough to satisfy a dragon’s appetite. Probably those legendary fish that always eluded the Sea Hold nets. Her Sea Hold sent their tithe of sea produce, salted, pickled or smoked, to Benden Weyr. Occasionally a dragonrider came asking for fresh fish for a special feasting, like a Hatching. And the women of the Weyr came every spring and fall to berry or cut withies and grasses. Menolly had once served Manora, the headwoman of Benden Lower Caverns, and a very pleasant gentle woman she’d been, too. Menolly hadn’t been allowed to stay in the room long because Mavi shooed her daughters out, saying that she had things to discuss with Manora. But Menolly had seen enough to know she liked her.
    The whole flock of lizards suddenly went aloft, startled by the return of the queen and the bronze who had flown her. The pair settled wearily in the warm shallow waters, wings spread as if both were too exhausted to fold them back. The bronze tenderly twined his neck about his queen’s and they floated so, while blues excitedly offered the resting pair fingertails and rockmites.
    Entranced, Menolly watched from her screen of seagrass. She was utterly engrossed by the small doings of eating, cleaning and resting. By and by, singly or in pairs, the lesser fire lizards winged up to the first of the sea-surrounded bluffs, lost quickly from Menolly’s sight as they secreted themselves in tiny creviced weyrs.
    With graceful dignity, the queen and her bronze rose from their bathing. How they managed to fly with their glistening wings so close together, Menolly didn’t know. As one, they seemed to dart aloft, then glided in a slow spiral down to the Dragon Stones, disappearing on the seaside and out of Menolly’s vision.
    Only then did she become conscious of discomfort; of the hot sun on her welted back, sand in the waistband of her trousers,